Hey, this is the Daily Overpass! My name is Eric and I make apps. Now today, let's
talk a little bit about Windows Mobile and the other Android markets.
Alright, so today, I want to answer a question from Abby Dabby from episode 145 who said,
"Hey Eric. Is it worth it to upload apps on Windows Store for Windows Mobile and
which Android markets are the best by 2017? I've watched your old video about
markets. I am using Play Store,c Samsung Apps and Amazon. I have
also tried many others, but they sucks." So, let me talk about Windows Mobile
first. This is a- I mean, this is kind of a big confession. I've never actually
released an app to Windows Mobile. Now, I've tried and I've been very interested in
in the past, right? You know, when we- because a lot of the times, we use the
hybrid frameworks or cross-platform frameworks like Corona SDK. It's not a
big task in order to- for us to put things on the windows market.
I mean, I have Windows PCs around all over the place.
I have the developer certificate and I paid even for
the developer account and all this kind of stuff. But when it came time to doing
it, it was just that little bit extra and it was kind of that- me
trying to wonder whether that was worth it. So, I guess to answer the
question, like my personal opinion, is it hasn't been worth it just because I
haven't even tried it. But I could be completely wrong. The reason I've been
interested in it, is the same reason why if you have a like a friend in high
school or whatever, who used to joined the cheerleading team, like a guy who
joined the cheerleading team in high school and his rationale was there are
all girls and there's only like two guys, man, so like, you know, you have less
competition or whatever. And that was my whole thing too. I thought, maybe if I go
onto the Windows market, there might not be a lot of apps on that App Store and
maybe a lot of users, so maybe my apps would be found easier and all this kind
of stuff. But when I talk to other developers, they tell me they don't have
that experience at all. They just have find it really difficult. They
don't get a lot of downloads and everything. But, you
know, so anybody out there who's released to the Windows market, please let us
know in the comments what kind of experience you've had, because
I was kind of hoping it would be like this- be like a big
fish in a small pond or a small- so anyway, it's like your app
would be a lot more noticeable in a smaller market. But from people I spoke
to, that hasn't really been the case. The thing is, I really would
like to see Windows Mobile work, right? It's been that- is
that big hope of Windows developers. See, I've always been like a Windows
developer. My favorite language is JavaScript.
My second favorite language, my favorite compiled language is C#.
Yeah, I really like using it. I love using it as a contractor. I like it much more
than I like Java. I like it more than I like Swift and I sure as hell I can want
more that Objective-C. So, you know, it would have been nice to use that.
I know I could have used Xamarin, I could use Unity, but I've just-
I just use Java. Right now, I use JavaScript for like ionic stuff, Java for
Android, use a little bit of Objective-c
for iOS apps and Swift. Swift is a preference and I use Lua for
Corona SDK, so kind of jumping around all over the place, but you know, I really
like using - I like using Windows. The only reason I moved to
a Mac was like I could compile onto an iPhone. In fact, you know, for a while I
was still a contractor and I had these apps on the app market, so I
switched over to a Mac, and I was not a big fan of Windows
8. So this was a few years ago. Alright, but you know, everybody
would always talk - Mac people are always talking about how great the
Mac is. "Oh, it's just a breath of fresh air."
"Oh, everything, it just works." "It's just such a beautiful platform
to work on." "I look forward to going.." When I use a Mac, when I open it, the
clouds part, the Sun shines through my head, I got sick of hearing it, right?
So, when I use a Mac, there's always high expectations that I think it
it's fine. It's a beauty. I have to learn all the Ctrl+C
and the command B and all this kind of stuff. They could have a setting on that
for Windows users, but they won't. Because the're Apple.
Apple doesn't change for anybody. So, I might be jaded. But I do
use a Mac now and used to it in the last few years.
But the Windows phone, that was the big hope for Windows
developers. That was the thing where we can start making apps
too. We can start putting things out there and then if it took
over- but they just- it seemed like they just really dropped the ball with that.
At least that's my opinion. I've gone through and tried to create
apps, I've created- I have actually created one native app in Windows
Mobile. It was for a contract I was in and it was like- it was a lot like using
Silverlight. It was- it would be a pretty cool- everything. But you know,
just never really caught on. When it came to actually
put in my own apps over there, like I said it was only- we're using
hybrid stuff when we can, so it wouldn't be a lot of work to port it over to
Windows - to Windows mobile. You have to learn the whole new way of
doing in-app purchases, if you put ads in there, you have to make sure
the ad network supports Windows apps so that if they have to display an ad for
another application, they can click on that and go to like the Windows
Play Store or the Google Play Store if they're on a on a Windows
device. Just like a whole different learning curve there and like I said, if
I knew it was worth it, if I knew that it was worth it, I would have tried it. I
guess, to answer the question a little bit, like from my point of view,
it hasn't been worth it. But I'm saying that from the experience of
somebody who hasn't even really done it. So, you know, if any of you guys out there
who released apps to the Windows Store, please let us know how that's worked for
you. Cuz you know I would like to think that- you go in there,
there's less competition. Your apps are found, all that kind of stuff. Yeah, I
don't know if that's gonna really be the case. Now, when it comes
these other markets, when I started out, I was trying to release the Amazon stuff
or sorry- the Google's stuff too, sorry, the Android applications - every app, every
app store that was available. So, you know, the Google Play Store,
Amazon, of course, Samsung was the big one.
We got- we did much better on Samsung than we did on Amazon. Then
we tried like to slide it. I can't remember them anymore, but for a while
we're trying like all these different ones that were putting out as many
places as possible. But we were only doing
the free ones cuz like I said, it was just a case of figuring out how the
in-app purchases worked with all these other markets and everything like that. I
don't think I've ever- I've ever made any money through Samsung, so it may
have been like a little bit maybe, like you know twenty dollars or something,
in terms of purchases through Amazon. I think I just gave up on Amazon.
I think it was, you know, I just released free apps on Amazon, and
I don't really have a lot of experience there either. I know
I've spoken to other people who when they use Amazon, they say Amazon works
much better for them than Google Play does. But that's definitely not the case
for me. So I'd be interested to hear out how the rest
of you, guys, do. First of all, have you tried to release your app to Windows
mobile or to Windows Phone and how has it done- how is it done in
comparison to Google Play or to the iOS, the App Store and second,
what other android markets have you used and how have they fared. For me, it's
every- all the other ones have been like a pale comparison to Google Play, but
that's my experience, so like even now, I don't even bother with
the other markets anymore. A lot of that side of the laziness, you know, but
you're figuring out how sitting all those in-app purchases
up and everything like that, I just really deal with Play Store now. But
if I had more time, I'd probably do more of them. Anyway, that's
it for today. Let me know what you, guys, think. We'll talk to you, guys, tomorrow.